around the age of 13 I bought a comic book. B&W, glossy color cover, probably self-published. bikini/pinup style cover. flat empty artwork with occasional grey ?watercolor washes. often backgroundless panels, US, weird combination of manga and architectural rendering. detailed focus on a few objects, guns, for example drawn carefully enough for the model to be identified, if I do not exaggerate my recollection. and the rest expanses of white-- in the 'plot' too. can't find a title now, the first place I ever heard the pixies.

over the carefully delineated yacht's sound system came 'drive my car into the ocean' 'I sail away on waves of mutilation'. I somehow guessed the tune correctly! well the phrase ends, at least. I don't think I got the backbeat harmony rise. I sang it to myself several times, and savored it!occasionally I'd remember that tune I'd supposed with the words later, and if in public, once, at a party I remember clearly, in a kitchen (6, 7 years later!), I would still sing what I'd thought was the tune-- a little scared, knowing I'd made it up, but also strangely confident in my surmise. intentionally giving some uncertainty-harmonic-character to the pitches. this has become part of my voice quality. 'true voice'. still wonder what Chris Cohen heard in my voice that made him imagine a part for me in his 'invisible string'.

my mysterious conception of the tune wasn't controverted until I finally heard a recording, basically unbidden, only 3 years ago. turned loose on Discka Bob's stash for a week, I copied a few pixies shows along with a mass of other material. no metadata beyond show place and time noted on the CDs themselves. Wading through that, I've only listened to it fully once, and otherwise, a handful of times. it's a bit too precious to look at directly the tenebr